June 2nd - Church

Sunday June 2 

Today I went to the ward here for the first time, which was about 150 in sacrament meeting. Priesthood was not quite as large, with a total of 7.  What I did find surprising was that almost the entire ward was latino, maybe 12 espanoles.  The good news is that the church is the same anywhere in the world, and so are latino wards.  It was just like all the wards from my mission, fun, loud, very social, and very kind/welcoming.  I also saw three sets of missionaries, two of which were sisters, which tells me that all in all we live in a pretty good sector of Barcelona.  After church ended we all went back to the house to celebrate Herlinda’s birthday.  When I say all, there were 14 of us, and the party went from 1 until past 6:00, the entire time being filled with small talk and food!

We had appetizers, a main courses, two desserts, and after dinner snacks.  It was certainly a great opportunity to practice my Spanish non-stop for a few hours.  Plus the food was good. Living with a Peruvian family what can you expect?  A couple of the traditional Peruvian dishes we had were ceviche y arroz con pollo.  Ceviche is raw fish marinated in citrus juice and served with plenty of spice and some vegetables.  Arroz con pollo may sound quite basic, but it was specially prepared after the Peruvian style.  For example, because of the peppers and spice the rice was green.  I have not eaten so much since the mission.  Yes I did change into stretchy pants.  By the time the festivities had ended I only had a couple hours so I decided to return to the Parc de la Ciutadela where I watched some more street performers, people watched for a while, and sketched the Arc de Triomf.